Oklahoma City early offseason in review (HW/bondom34/dbrandon/Slava)

[jazzfan1971]

I think you can knock a team for injury in some cases.

For instance, I knock the jazz for the exum injury. Not only was the depth at PG unable to keep the team afloat, but the front office waited way too long to trade for help.

Moving forward I might dock Portland or Sacramento for similar reasons if they suffer a season ending injury to their PG and don't take steps to address the weakness exposed until it is too late.

[bondom34]

And I'm rating what actually happened. A championship contender for the next 5 years heading into the offseason, a 2nd round contender now. That's an F in my book in a thread titled offseason in review. Agree to disagree.

Fair enough. It is a totally uninformed and uninspired way to analyze things, and if golden state has one injury I will remember to fail them as well. You are more than welcome to start up your own series if you'd like to write this up for everything, though I know you won't. Your intent was clear enough.

Bondom, I feel you're being a bit unfair to him. He explained the angle he's taking and why.

As for an injury, that is very subjective
a. An injury to Shaun Livingston isn't the same as one to Curry, just like losing Dion Waiters isn't the same as losing Durant.

b. An injury is completely out of one's control, while player movement is often very dependent on what a front office is doing as has done.

c. But even if a poster explicit says I'm taking into account injuries as judging their off-season (not judging their management/performance, rather simply the circumstance) it is their right to.

I feel like if this wasn't an OKC off-season review and he wasn't an GSW fan, you guys wouldn't be having this discussion so I'll stop there.

And I'm rating what actually happened. A championship contender for the next 5 years heading into the offseason, a 2nd round contender now. That's an F in my book in a thread titled offseason in review. Agree to disagree.

Fair enough. It is a totally uninformed and uninspired way to analyze things, and if golden state has one injury I will remember to fail them as well. You are more than welcome to start up your own series if you'd like to write this up for everything, though I know you won't. Your intent was clear enough.

I expect better than a mod accusing me of trolling when I explained my reasoning. And yes, if a warrior like Curry gets injured for the year it's a terrible offseason in my book. I'm certainly not going to get all pissy that you failed them. Try not to take my opinion so personally.

I'll just put it this way. I call a spade a spade. I've seen people grade different ways, and get it. But odd he's only shown up for one thread this whole 3-4 week span. Just sayin'.

[azwfan]

Can we not mention any "injury" and "Curry" in the same sentence?

I'm grading on the result:
I would give OKC's offseason a D. They lost Durant and i thought made a pretty good trade with the Ibaka trade. I would not give them an F because i think they are still a contender, but now i think they are kind of on the outside of the favorites looking in rather than being a few points a way from a Finals appearance.

Obviously, Durant is a huge loss, but i think Westbrook is capable of covering up for some of what was lost.

Instead of 50% Westbrook isos and 50% Durant Isos... you can run 60% Westbrook isos and get some more ball movement.
Westbrook is a beast. Gained a TON of respect for him during our 7 game series. Adams as well. I think OKC is going to be alright... they do need a SF though. They just traded for Lauv... from Denver. I think thats a nice move also. Presti doing work.
They'd get an A if Durant stayed (and the same moves were made).

[Andre Roberstan]

just leaving this here

http://stats.nba.com/league/player/#!/playtype/isolation/?dir=1&sort=Time

[azwfan]

Looking at the ISO stats, i forgot about losing Waiters. He was so horrible from what i saw in the regular season, but he seemed pretty good in the series against us. Not sure if that is a plus or minus. I'm inclined to go with losing Waiters being a positive.

They lost their two most ISO centric players. OKC is gonna be alright. I'm kind of excited to see if Westbrook comes back a man possessed. He's a lot of fun to watch.

[Andre Roberstan]

Looking at the ISO stats, i forgot about losing Waiters. He was so horrible from what i saw in the regular season, but he seemed pretty good in the series against us. Not sure if that is a plus or minus. I'm inclined to go with losing Waiters being a positive.

They lost their two most ISO centric players. OKC is gonna be alright. I'm kind of excited to see if Westbrook comes back a man possessed. He's a lot of fun to watch.

Losing Waiters is probably a positive. Oladipo is basically Waiters but actually solid.

Donovan said on Woj's podcast the other day that they're going to try to share the ball around more than people might expect. Russ actually had his lowest usage rate in a long time last season IIRC. The Don made the point that in the year where the whole team was injured, Russ carried the load because they were basically improvising new lineups all the time on the fly. This year they should be able to design a playbook and scheme around him with some level of purpose instead of ad hoc.

I still think he's going to be the guy around which everything revolves, but anyone expecting Kobe-esque usage is likely to be disappointed.

[Texas Chuck]

I still think he's going to be the guy around which everything revolves, but anyone expecting Kobe-esque usage is likely to be disappointed.

As a fan of Westbrook, but not so much the Thunder, this does disappoint me. I would love to see 40/10/10 games night after night.

But obviously for the Thunder as a team its probably best that yeah everything revolves around him, but they get better ball movement and take advantage of the pressure he puts on defenses.

[HartfordWhalers]

I feel like we are distracting ourselves from how great it is to commend me.

Maybe we should get back on topic.

[Texas Chuck]

I feel like we are distracting ourselves from how great it is to commend me.

Maybe we should get back on topic.

Watch on YouTube

[HartfordWhalers]

I feel like we are distracting ourselves from how great it is to commend me.

Maybe we should get back on topic.

Watch on YouTube

So, this should be where we left things.

If people want to debate process versus results, it is a great debate and one I love seeing.
If people want to debate if Waiters is worthless, thats always fun too. Or anything similar about the OKC offseason.

If there are any petty squabbles taking away from my musical interlude, I'm going to be angry and likely to take my hockey team and leave town. So don't push me.

[Old Man Game]

I sort of think grading a team down for an injury is unfair, especially if it occurs when the player is off doing his own thing on Summer break. Just my two cents.

Which is not to say that a player leaving in free agency is necessarily comparable. As has been pointed out in this thread there are a variety of reasons a player might leave based on how he views the organization's past moves/treatment. But I do think the injury question serves to illustrate the fallacy of viewing this strictly in terms of their prospects entering the off season compared to their prospects at the end of the off season. Basically grading a team's off season is not amenable to a bright line rule such as that.

[Old Man Game]

Looking at the ISO stats, i forgot about losing Waiters. He was so horrible from what i saw in the regular season, but he seemed pretty good in the series against us. Not sure if that is a plus or minus. I'm inclined to go with losing Waiters being a positive.

They lost their two most ISO centric players. OKC is gonna be alright. I'm kind of excited to see if Westbrook comes back a man possessed. He's a lot of fun to watch.

As a fan of the team its a bummer because our title chances are practically zero now, but in terms of night in night out fun factor, I think there's a chance that's actually improved (although admittedly that view is mitigated because we'll probably lose more regular season games and losing even in January isn't fun). Russ is a force of nature and he's now going to have free rein.

[Fotis St]

Gave a C.
Lost Durant but kept Westbrook.
The Ibaka trade will look better and better in the future.
If Abrines gets his shot in the 3pt NBA range, you are more than fine.
Ersan and Abrines shooting long jumpers is the key to success.
Good luck

[azwfan]

Looking at the ISO stats, i forgot about losing Waiters. He was so horrible from what i saw in the regular season, but he seemed pretty good in the series against us. Not sure if that is a plus or minus. I'm inclined to go with losing Waiters being a positive.

They lost their two most ISO centric players. OKC is gonna be alright. I'm kind of excited to see if Westbrook comes back a man possessed. He's a lot of fun to watch.

As a fan of the team its a bummer because our title chances are practically zero now, but in terms of night in night out fun factor, I think there's a chance that's actually improved (although admittedly that view is mitigated because we'll probably lose more regular season games and losing even in January isn't fun). Russ is a force of nature and he's now going to have free rein.

I would not say title chances are zero. I would just say they aren't one of the favorites. Well GSW wasn't the favorite (or one of the favorites) the year we won the title either. In order to win the title you need one of the top players in basketball. OKC still has that. They also have another guy (Adams) who is pretty darn good. If Westbrook can beast (and we know he can), and they can get their others to defend and step up and hit big shots... they can win it.

[StepBackCrack]

There is no right or wrong way to grade a team's off-season as long as you are clear how you are looking at it IMO.

That said, if you want to look at what OKC management had in their control since their season ended, one could argue they had a good off-season. at the same time if you think their trade of Ibaka influenced Duran't decision or impacted the team negatively overall, maybe you did not think they did. Or perhaps you think there where other moves they could have made to keep Durant.

Also, some may say what they had control over is not based on a single point in time, rather a culmination of moves and efforts. The fact that a top 3 player left a contender is a rather harsh reality and can be viewed as something that they did have plenty of influence over leading up to the actual decision by KD. Or perhaps you think they had no influence over the matter and KD was going to leave no matter what.

Overall, I for one do have to have to penalize them for losing one of their own FAs. Most top FAs stay with their teams (especially contenders) if for no other reason than money and familiarity and I do wonder if there were moves they could have made or moves they shouldn't have made. As good as the value of the Ibaka trade was, Ibaka was still part of their core and fit a very important role for that team. I think his demise was over-stated and their breaking up of the starting 5 by not only moving him but adding a ball dominant, non-shooter in Oladipo and and inferior PF to the mix was understated.

Great post.

[RexRyan]

Losing Durant sucks, extending Russ is great, and they absolutely fleeced Orlando in the Ibaka trade. B is as high as I can give them, losing a top three player, so B it is.

[HartfordWhalers]

HartfordWhalers Review

...

Free Agency:
Renegotiation and extended Russell Westbrook 3/$85.7m (PO last year)
Alex Abrines 3/$17.2m
Ronnie Price 2/$5m
Domantas Sabonis rookie scale

Great news on Westbrook. Besides that? Um. 17m or so in free agent money got Abrines and Ersan (contract gtd) and Price. Add on the left over cap room the team has, and OKC had close to 19m to use to get starting forwards. Could ~19m get a better forward rotation than Abrines/Ilyasova?

It really depends on Abrines, but with ~21m in cap holds for Adams and Oladipo next offseason the time to get a long term piece at one of the forward slots was now. And signing price now for the room exception versus waiting feels silly. I do wonder if OKC is somewhat payroll constrained (again), as they didn't go up to the cap, or use the over the cap exception and that is extremely rare for a playoff team to do. The problem is the sf crop this year was crap outside the very top guys. Abrines might just have been the best realistic option, unless you believe Wes Johnson was worth more than 6m a year.

Still, I would have been pretty tempted to take that ~19m and offer Ryan Anderson the same contract he got from Houston to be a rich man's Ilyasova. And then just left sf a mess I suppose. I guess all the signings are fine.
...

And now that Price has been cut, that signing looks even sillier.

[bondom34]

Yeah, and I was fine w/ that signing at the time. Strangely Semaj kinda looked better preseason IMO.

[HartfordWhalers]

Yeah, and I was fine w/ that signing at the time. Strangely Semaj kinda looked better preseason IMO.

I'm assuming that 2nd year will get stretched. But losing just under 2.5m after this year on the deal already is bad as it carries over the mistake. Still keeping Semaj was smart.

[Trader_Joe]

There is no right or wrong way to grade a team's off-season as long as you are clear how you are looking at it IMO.

That said, if you want to look at what OKC management had in their control since their season ended, one could argue they had a good off-season. at the same time if you think their trade of Ibaka influenced Duran't decision or impacted the team negatively overall, maybe you did not think they did. Or perhaps you think there where other moves they could have made to keep Durant.

Also, some may say what they had control over is not based on a single point in time, rather a culmination of moves and efforts. The fact that a top 3 player left a contender is a rather harsh reality and can be viewed as something that they did have plenty of influence over leading up to the actual decision by KD. Or perhaps you think they had no influence over the matter and KD was going to leave no matter what.

Overall, I for one do have to have to penalize them for losing one of their own FAs. Most top FAs stay with their teams (especially contenders) if for no other reason than money and familiarity and I do wonder if there were moves they could have made or moves they shouldn't have made. As good as the value of the Ibaka trade was, Ibaka was still part of their core and fit a very important role for that team. I think his demise was over-stated and their breaking up of the starting 5 by not only moving him but adding a ball dominant, non-shooter in Oladipo and and inferior PF to the mix was understated.

Do KD's statements about the team going younger as opposed to targeting vets change anyone's feelings about that trade or their off-season?

Of course it probably comes down to whether you believe KD actually meant that when he said it or if it was simply a future justification. He's seemingly been rather open (not sure about honest) about his motivations, but I even thought that trade might have influenced his decision and did not like it as much as most.